The Art of Subtlety
by Jana Kay
Summary: Just what was Cordy thinking before she put cinnamon in Angel's blood? (Warning!! This contains hints of M/M SLASH.)


TITLE: The Art of Subtlety   
AUTHOR: Jana Kay  
EMAIL: jana_kay17@yahoo.com.au  
DISCLAIMER: All characters named here belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, the WB and 20th Century Fox. No profit being made, I'm just playing.  
RATING: PG-13 but be warned, there are hints of **M/M SLASH** in here.   
SPOILERS: S1 Angel and 'Judgement.' Takes place just before the opening scene of 'AYNOHYEB,' where Cordelia brings everyone drinks.  
SUMMARY: Just what was Cordy thinking before she put cinnamon in Angel's blood?  
NOTES: **...** = actions *...* = emphasis ((...)) = extra thoughts   
  
***  
  
Drinks, drinks ... let's see what I've got.  
  
**opens cupboard**  
  
Coffee! Lots and lots of coffee. Well that's definitely me. Vision girl recently, and coffee girl ... well kinda always. Guess it's a vice.  
  
Hmm, never knew I had a vice before. I don't think I like it ... but coffee keeps me alert when we're fighting butt-ugly demons ... not to mention all the adrenaline and heart pounding *FEAR* so I don't think I'll be stopping anytime soon.  
  
**puts water on to boil and grabs down two mugs**  
  
**measures out a teaspoon of coffee**  
  
**puts it in one mug**  
  
Now Wesley, he's got a lot of them. Books, preferably old and moldy, tea, only his special British-Guy tea which we've argued over like a million times, and men ... but yeah right, he'll never admit that last one, especially if you consider the fact that it took *me* so long to figure out in the first place.  
  
Come to think of it, I don't even know how I did. Maybe it was just the way he always glanced a second too long at Angel, a wisp of a smile tracing his lips and his eyes lighting up as they caressed broad shoulders under black leather, or the way he looked at Gunn sometimes when they were talking, glasses slipping down his nose just enough to show a feral look hiding behind a thin veil, almost as though he wanted to ...   
  
Okay! I *so* don't need to be thinking of Wesley's love life or lack there of.  
  
**opens cupboard again**  
  
I know there's tea in here somewhere, so where is it? He bought some at the store and brought it over here specifically, and he always checks to see when it's running out so he can get some more. He *always* has to have his tea. Like I said, vice.  
  
And you know, he's so British that he doesn't even drink coffee in a crisis, like Giles sometimes did.  
  
It's kind of funny actually. You would always know there was an apocalypse coming if you saw Tweed-Man with his 'Kiss the Librarian' mug ((which I gave him for Christmas the year before I left thank-you-very-much all wrapped up with a shiny bow)) filled with freshly brewed coffee. I almost had a heart attack the first time I saw it, and I didn't even know what it meant yet.   
  
I wonder ... does he still do it?   
  
It's weird to think of life in Sunnydale still going on when you're not there. Because of course, you know it is. It's the Hellmouth after all. Buffy is still the Slayer and slaying away, Willow is still the witchy-witch, getting busy with her spells, and Xander ... well I still don't know what he does ((except research)) but they've kept him around so long he *must* have a purpose.  
  
And I guess all the stuff that I used to do is now being done by demon-girl and Willow's friend, not to mention Riley, the Iowa boy I've heard *so* much about from Angel.  
  
And no I don't pay any attention because Angel loves Buffy, and no matter what Wesley and I think he'll *always* love Buffy, and therefore whatever his views of Buffy's new boyfriend, they'll undoubtedly be clouded.  
  
Because if there's one thing I know about Buffy, she has good taste in men.  
  
Aha! I knew it was here.  
  
**takes tea out**  
  
**sniffs**  
  
Oh ew, gross. I think there's something wrong with this. It smells a little *too* much like old wax mixed with pot-pourri. And flowers. Is it supposed to have flowers in it?   
  
**shudders**  
  
Is this a new brand? Well he can just drink it anyway. I mean *I* don't know about tea. Maybe it's supposed to smell that way. And besides, it's *tea*, it can't go off. Add some boiling water, he'll never even notice.  
  
**puts the bag in a mug**  
  
Okay ... now where's that water?  
  
**kettle whistles**  
  
There it is.  
  
**pours water in both mugs**  
  
**adds milk and sugar to first mug and stirs**  
  
**puts them on a tray**  
  
Well that's two down. Now where's ...?  
  
**checks in refrigerator**   
  
Damn! Oh wait ... oh there it is. Last bag, right at the back.  
  
Is he hiding them again?  
  
Idiot. I'm so not disgusted by him drinking blood anymore. You think he'd notice by the way I bring them to him and stay in the same room as he drinks, even going so far as to tell him to hurry up and just *drink* the stupid thing already instead of just hemming and hawing around it, fingers twitching around the container because I know he wants to drink it but he's too ashamed by the need ... but he always was Mr Oblivious, capital M, capital O, so I can't expect too much.  
  
**pulls it out and takes off cap**  
  
**sniffs**  
  
Smells like copper pennies.  
  
**sniffs again**  
  
Like, *really.* Has this thing gone off? Wait, no. I only bought it yesterday. It was the other one that went off, and I threw it out.   
  
**sniffs a third time**  
  
So why does it smell like this? Maybe I should warm it up ... Wait, no. He doesn't like that.  
  
Well actually, he does. I've seen him drink blood warm when he thinks nobody's paying attention to him. Like, as if! We always pay attention to him, even though it may not look like it. Soulful or not, he's still a vampire, and the silly thing with us humans is that we fall into habits easily, and so if you start to get used to ignoring one vampire, you might accidentally start ignoring another, and then another, and another, and then pretty soon you end up dead. Now that's something I'm so *not* wanting.   
  
And so Angel, when he thinks we're not watching him, he pours the blood into a mug and everything rather than just having it in a container, and his fingers are completely white as he clutches his hands tight around the mug, bones sticking out so you can see the individual tendons. And I've never seen him drink anything so quickly before, as if he just can't get enough of it.   
  
You know, for two-and-a-half centuries old, he can be pretty damn *NOT* sneaky.  
  
I wonder why he does that?  
  
Maybe he thinks he's not allowed to drink it warm, that it goes against the whole warrior background he's built up around himself from the rubble, or that drinking it warm reminds him too much of all the times he's actually taken it warm straight from the source. A neck or a thigh or a ...   
  
**shudders**  
  
Okay I'm not thinking about that. He's Angel, he's my best friend, he's not killing anymore, I'm not going to think of this.  
  
... But you know, it's kind of hard *not* to think about when he vamps out in a fight, and he's snarling and growling and no matter what you're doing, you feel like stopping dead in your tracks as the sound rumbles through your bones, your muscles trying to twitch into instant fight or flight, and then out of the corner of your eye you see him moving like a 6"2' predator, straight at his target with a single-minded intensity that rattles you so much you just can't move, and you know, you just *know* deep inside you that he won't stop coming until you're *dead*.   
  
And it's kind of hard then not to think about all the innocent people he hunted before, who were in the exact same position as you and raced against the clock to seek shelter before he grabbed them up in his arms and sunk his fangs right in and ...  
  
Or about the one's that he wined and dined and made feel special before he took them back to his place, or they took him back to their place and invited him in and ...  
  
Whoo boy. Let's not go there anymore, okay brain? Or I may start hating him and ... okay it wasn't *Angel*, it was *Angelus*, there's a difference.  
  
.........  
  
Oh who am I trying to kid. I've been fooling myself for a couple of years now, and it's really getting tiring.   
  
They're not separate people, and even though I hate admitting it, it's not fair to Angel to like him because of a lie.  
  
Angel is Angelus, just as much as Angelus is Angel.  
  
I told Angel last year I'd kill him dead if he ever lost his soul again, but after I said it, I made the mistake of hanging around the big lug too much. I got to know him after that. Like *really.* Quirks and nuances and little habits that you'd probably never share to anybody unless you knew you were dying the next day, and then Rebecca and her happy drug came along and I was forced to realise that, I didn't think I could do it after all.  
  
It scared me to think I actually had something in common with Buffy. We all got so mad at her because she couldn't just stake his ass already in junior year, but I'm putting myself in the exact same position now.  
  
And I'm not even as strong as Buffy. She could barely do it, how the heck am I supposed to?  
  
All it takes is that one niggling doubt. What if I'm staking the wrong one?  
  
They share the same body and have the exact same facial expressions. They know as much about you as the other incarnation does. They're skilled in the art of manipulation to the extreme, whether it's Angelus so you'll invite him in against your better judgement, or Angel so you'll leave him alone even after he did something unacceptable.  
  
One look, one touch, and you find yourself thinking, there has to be some Angel in there somewhere. The soul couldn't have made no impact at all after a hundred or more years. Just like when Angel touches you sometimes and his grip is a little harder than it should be, his words harsher than you expect them to be, and you know that Angel isn't all flowers and puppy-eyes like you want to believe so badly. Not house-broken or on a leash, no not at all.  
  
He's a demon with a muzzle. And one that isn't really wanted.  
  
He said so himself, didn't he?  
  
There's a clarity that comes with being solely evil, and he misses it sometimes.  
  
No more guilt, no more pain, no more wishing he could have done things differently so none of us ever got hurt. No holding my hand so tightly I had bruises after I came out of my vision trance, no constantly helping Wesley around for a week because he wasn't allowed to leave without a wheelchair.  
  
And when you start to think of how much you're really friends with a demon, you start to get scared of just how much danger you're really in.  
  
Even the happiest and most well-adjusted puppy will bite you sometimes if you're not careful.  
  
And the problem with Angel is that he really does bite.  
  
And you know that no matter how close you are to him, no matter how much you care for him and want to be there for him when he needs you, there's every chance that one day, he might find himself staring at your neck, a demon's voice whispering in his head about how sweet it would be going down his throat. How even warm blood, his secret vice, is no match for the real thing.  
  
Scalding and pumping and flowing like a river down his throat.  
  
But I'm really stupid I suppose, because I really do love him. Not *love* love, but love. He's my best friend. He's been practically everything to me this past year, it's weird now imagining my life with him not in it.  
  
And for all the bad times, there's a zillion good times to make up for the fact that I'm best friends with a some*thing* rather than a some*one*.  
  
Plus he acts so immature and childish sometimes, so weak and human that it's surprisingly easy to forget that he's not human at all.   
  
**puts container on tray**  
  
But everyone makes mistakes. Humans, demons, it's the one thing we have in common I guess.  
  
So if I just happen to spice up his usual routine a little, who could blame me?  
  
Just a little something, so he'll forget about our necks for a while, just a little something to be sure.  
  
Because you're my friend Angel, and so is Wesley and even Gunn, and I don't want to see any of us get hurt.  
  
**takes cinnamon off spice rack**  
  
**uncaps and taps some into the blood**  
  
What, I can't try something?  
  
  
~Finis~  



End file.
